Hello kind Bethesdians,

I'm writing to you on behalf of the http://openmw.org team. We are a group of fans writing a new multi-platform engine capable of playing Morrowind. We do not distribute any Bethesda owned art assets and direct and encourage our users to purchase Morrowind on Steam.

After four years of development OpenMW is finally at the stage of implementing skills, attributes, and magical effects. Before we spend countless hours reverse engineering formulas in Morrowind, we thought we'd first ask you for help first. If Bethesda could provide these formulas it would save huge amounts of time that could be spent in other development areas. Even if we had the formulas we expect it to be another year and a half before our project reaches maturity. However, we believe OpenMW could be beneficial for Bethesda in the following ways.

• Once OpenMW is fully playable, users from around the world can translate Morrowind into their own language. These free localization projects could open the game up to new markets.
  
• We already support Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows, but Ogre3d and bullet (two pieces of software we use) are used on Android and iOS devices. It's possible in five years there'll be a heavily modded version of Morrowind playing on mobile devices.
  
• OpenMW will continue to be updated and improved, getting better over time. The rise of digital distribution allows old games to sell much longer than the traditional video game lifespan. Supporting our project keeps your aging and unmaintained product fresh. Investing little or no money, Bethesda will benefit from our team and fans acting as guerilla marketing for Bethesda's decade old game; directing users to purchase the game on Steam or where ever you suggest.
  
• Bethesda could develop new mini expansion packs or art asset packs similar to the free to play game model. The latter could include new items, clothing, armor, pets, buildings and weapons for a small fee. Bethesda need only pay for the artists making the new items.
  
• OpenMW could turn Morrowind into a sandbox à la Garry's Mod (which has sold 1,000,000 copies) for the Source Engine. Users of Garry's Mod might buy Morrowind in order to have art assets for playing around with in OpenMW.
  
• Since you sell Morrowind for $20 dollars on Steam, it could act as a cheap entry into the series for new users. Those users could go on to buy other Bethesda games.
  
• An open engine means users can really experiment. If Bethesda keeps an eye on what the community does it can get inspiration for new ideas for new games. What is a free experiment in the community, could became a polished commercial game in Bethesda's hands. Free R & D is always nice.

Thank you for making such a good game and thank you for your time.


Sincerely,

The OpenMW team

This is an interesting project - I had to google it first though. As I understand, the Open Morrowind project is basically an attempt to take Morrowind and 'rewrite/remake/remaster' it into new code or a new engine that will, presumably be something like a 'mega mod'...is that correct? You seem to suggest that it requires owning an original copy of Morrowind, but why would that be, other than moral/ethical/legal reasons?

Either way, I think Bethesda could do a lot to dispel the ill will many Morrowind players are beginning to feel towards the company for the design direction of the newer games as well as...well...blowing Morrowind up, lore-wise, for no good reason. And I hope they'll get behind this project, though I doubt they will...lord knows they have enough money.

OpenMW does not distribute any art assets owned by Bethesda Softworks. If you don't buy Morrowind, then sure, you can download our engine, but you won't have any content to do anything with.

So you run the engine and it takes all of the existing artwork, content, etc. and projects it onto the new engine? What implications does this have for using our favorite modifications with Open Morrowind? Will they run 'seamlessly' on your engine, or is their compatibility a much more problematic question?

Please have a look at our webpage for those http://openmw.org/faq/ and keep on the topic of this thread. If you have have further questions, here is our http://openmw.org/forum/.

Alright, I'll stop popping questions. That way the thread will be nice and uncluttered for when Bethesda responds.

Any suggestions on how to get Bethesda's attention?

PM someone at Betheda? Like GStaff? To be blunt, I doubt that anybody at bethesda reads this forum.

I don't understand...
You're completely remaking Morrowind, but with the same art, just so that you can mod an already easily mod able game?

It is a new game engine hopefully with less bugs and greater capabilities than the original. ie Morrowind should run better and allow for the development of types of mods that are currently not possible.

I'll let GStaff (Bethesda's community manager) know about this thread.

Come on, Bethesda, be the good guys!

Unfortunately, this is not something that we can do.

Good luck to you guys!

Since Bethesda cant help, your best bet is to look at UESP, with over 10 years worth of information, most of the formulas should be listed there in text form relating to each skill/attribute.

That's too bad Bethesda...taking that plunge, going outside the conventional user-developer relationship, and working outside the lines is really what differentiates a good company from a great company.

Are you still a great company?

Thanks povuholo for getting their attention.

@Gstaff thanks for the well wishes.

We'll survive, our developers are used to the trenches of OpenMW development. And you guys are right, there are a lot of formulas already available.

@all windows users
We need bug testers badly to test how the game is working under Windows.

I'm going to guess they can't help for legal reasons. eg, the person that invented the formulas doesn't work for Bethesda anymore, and it may cause legal problems if they suddenly release his work.


Good luck OpenMW, been having a look at your stuff on and off for ages, it looking really good!

Well of course there are legal reasons - there always are. The lawyers say 'no...it's better not to', because that's their job. I'm sure there would be ways around virtually any concern imaginable, but I guess it's not really productive to discuss it. Too bad, in any case.

Unfortunately, these would not be the developers deciding either. It would be Zenimax Media or something.

I am glad that Gstaff answered though as it shows that dialogue between users and developers is still possible through this forum.
It's not that I am saying that every "I hate Morrowind/Oblivion/Skyrim/etc..." thread should get a developer response.

But, it would be nice to hear what the developers have to say about certain things. e.g. Why did you implement that?
My guess would be that this correlates to a problem that forums and the internet in general is suffering from: negativism. I am no saint, I've been pretty negative on these forums myself, mostly about Skyrim but I think that developer input could partially solve this problem. We are negative because we get no answers almost as if the games were designed by robots. This causes us to get angry when we think something is wrong or illogical because no-one offers an explanation.
If your computer starts crashing for no reason you get angry as well because it does not say why it is crashing. We need to remember, perhaps even know, that the developers are human too, that they do things we mistake for mistakes while they had perfectly good reasons to do so.
Humans who do not always do what we think is best.
But humans nonetheless, and I would like that a lot more than the silenced yelling against our computer screens that we have now.

Intellectual property ... Hummpff. I guess it's hard to release something, so happily. Or maybe the information sank in the sea long ago, with the Titanic ... In any case, at least someone has replied.
I do not think any human beings capable of reading and responding to what's going on here daily. But a little conversation ...

Well, maybe Gstaff, he can.

Too bad, though. But I think yourselves will find the way ... and better.
Many moods ... and up! up!.

Don't forget that Hrnchamd also figured out a number of formulas for his Morrowind code patch. Perhaps he is willing to help here and there?

True, if you can find him he might be able to help a little.

He found out that the calm spell simple called a 'stop combat' command every frame regardless of the spell's strength, and how the blind spell actually increases the chance to hit rather than decreases it.